Lucky
Lucky & Master is a 2000 American animated musical fantasy buddy comedy-adventure film produced by ClearWorld Entertainment, Dualstar Entertainment Group and Warner Bros. Feature Animation. It was directed by Tianna Hopes and Kyler Fischer from a screenplay by Hopes, Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger and a story by Thalia Ward, Hopes, and Fischer, and stars the voices of Mary-Kate Olsen and Ashley Olsen (who also narrated the film in the beginning and the ending), Beverley Mitchell, Haley Joel Osment, Jodi Benson, Chris Rock, James Hong, Kate Higgins, Queen Latifah, Catherine O'Hara, Elijah Wood, Jeremy Irons, Samantha Mathis, Dennis Hopper and Jason Marsden. It was the Olsen twins' first theatrical film release since 1995's It Takes Two. Set in a world between cute and fantasy and mixed with Middle Ages and modern-day, the film centers on a young cute girl named Alexis, who lives in cute village and become a leader of cute, and a young mysterious girl named Karla, who lives in fantasy village and become a master, must team up to defeat the mysterious figure who wants to kill cute and fantasy. Lucky & Master was originally released on May 5, 2000 to positive reviews from critics, who praised its animation, characters, music, and voice acting. It was a success at the box office, earning over $543 million worldwide on its $58 million budget, making it the second highest-grossing animated film of 2000. Lucky & Master saw a 3D re-release in theaters on March 6, 2015 to celebrate its 15th anniversary, with the addition of two new musical numbers: "Shapeshifter" and "My Lovely Queen" into the film, and an all-new song "That's What I Like" (sung by singer Flo Rida and Fitz), which was added into the edited dating/skating sequence. A television series based on the film aired from August 2001 to February 2004, and a sequel was released on the JeremyNow! streaming service on February 7, 2020. Plot The people of cute and fantasy who live together in an almost perpetual state of fun, adventures, singing, dancing, and being teamwork. However, they are attacked by a herd of darkness monsters, led by Lady Daniela, forcing the cute, led by Lauren with her baby daughter Alexis, and fantasy, led by Kieran with his baby daughter Karla to flee the village and split each other. The cute find the better place as they come across the creatures, while fantasy build a new empire. After Daniela failed to kill Cute and Fantasy, Maddie's parents King Teagan and Queen Kaylie banishes Lady Daniela forever. She angrily vows to find the cute and fantasy and kill them, while the King and Queen tells her daughter that she would be the next queen. 20 years later (at the age of 20), Alexis, along with her friends, Paulina, Braden, Belinda, Tempo, Zed and Jaydan (who Alexis has a secret crush on), have a plan to throws a big party to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Cute's escape on their side, while Karla and her friends, Julissa and Skyler, have been warned that the darkness would return. At the party on the Cute village and during the battle with the herd of Griffins, led by Evilbeak, on the Fantasy village, Daniela, her darkness parrot Darkwit and her monsters having spent the last 20 years searching for the Cute and Fantasy, see the fireworks and kidnap Paulina, Braden, Balinda, Tempo, Zed, Phoenix, Jaydan, Julissa and Skyler. One of Daniela's monsters tries to kidnap Lauren and Kieran as well, but Alexis pushed Lauren under the stage for the party announcement, while Karla save Kieran and hides from Daniela. Daniela, Darkwit and her monsters then take the kidnapped friends back to their place, while secretly plotting to overthrow its monarchy in revenge for her banishment. Alexis must goes on a rescue mission alone, as well as Karla, who will goes on the journey to save Julissa. But later on, when Alexis gets into trouble, she is saved by Karla, which she thinks she will not make it if she goes alone. The two quickly form a bond, Karla accompanies Alexis, and they begin their journey. Unbeknownst to them, Evilbeak and the griffins (which who had tried to kill Karla earlier in the film) were hired by Daniela to capture Alexis and Karla. Alexis and Karla rest for the night. Alexis starts to sing and say goodnight to pictures of all her captured friends, which bugs Karla. Alexis talk to Karla about her life, which she had amazing adventures with her friend. Alexis also talk about her life, which she have a lot of fun over the years. Alexis starts singing "For The Love of Silence", with other forest creatures joining in. After a few misadventured events during the journey, while they find the magic sword, Alexis and Karla was getting attacked by Evilbeak and the griffins. As they about to kill them, a shapeshifting creature save Alexis and Karla. After they escaped from the griffins, the creature introduces herself as Kenzie, who known the path leads to Darkness Kingdom. When Alexis and Karla follow Kenzie in her horse forms, they wind up in Darkness Kingdom. Once inside the castle, Alexis, Karla and Kenzie find their friend in the dungeon, being guarded by a guard named Lawson, before they were noticed that Jaydan was missing. However, Lawson tell the other the truth that he have a crush on Queen Maddie (with Alexis and Paulina recognizing it as true love). Alexis offers to help him get a date with the Queen. Karla, Julissa and Skyler decides to help Lawson, Alexis, Paulina, Braden, Balinda and Tempo, while Zed, Phoenix and Kenzie take a break in Lawson's room. Lawson, disguised under the name of 'Sir Shadow' while others disguised as the darkness monsters, gets a date with Maddie and ask him for the feast. Alexis and her friends also teaches Karla, Julissa and Skyler regains control of the power of the sword. Having helped Lawson, Alexis, Karla, and the gang attempt to rescued Jaydan, but when they got to him, they are then recaptured by Evilbeak, the griffins and Daniela's monsters (who then recognize Alexis and Karla were Kieran and Lauren's twin daughters), due to Darkwit telling Daniela about their plan, and Daniela reveals that she is being helped by Jaydan, who is betraying them to spare himself from being killed, revealing himself to be a coward, faker and double-crossing traitor and that his 'captive' was actually a trap, much to Alexis' shock and surprise. Jaydan returns to the Cute village and visit the Fantasy village, where, using the cowbell, he lures the other people from both side, letting them be captured by Daniela and her monsters who lie in ambush. With everyone from both side captured, thrown into a dungeon, and soon Daniela later reveals that she would killed Cute and Fantasy and take over the kingdom forever, alongside with Evilbeak and the griffins, a heartbroken Alexis had been betrayed by her secret crush, and she and other people loses hope when she starts to cry. After heeding a advice Kanzie told her before, Karla tries to sing "Happiness In My Heart" for Alexis to cheer her up. However, the people are rescued by Kenzie who escaped from the dungeon after breaking the cell's wall and attacking the guards, and by Lawson, who is thankful for Alexis's help and for showing her how to be his true color, now being ready to accept the punishment for his 'treason'. While escaping, Alexis recognizing that every people from Darkness Kingdom have to be their true color, and rallies Karla to attempt a permanent solution to the conflict by showing the darkness to be who they are. The people of Darkness Kingdom are gathered for the feast, but Maddie wants to wait for her date. Daniela makes them start without him, but Lawson tells them they are all gone. Thinking Lawson lets them escape, Daniela and Darkwit furiously order her monsters to seize Lawson, until Alexis, Karla, and the gang crash in and reveal that was in fact Sir Shadow, and reveal that he have true color inside him, along with Maddie and the others, as the feeling that Lawson and Maddie had on their date was happiness and funniness. The group invite the everybody of Darkness Kingdom, including Daniela's monsters and the griffins to sing and dance with them, making the darkness creatures having their very own colors and that they just needed help to access. As Evilbeak is going to kill the group, but Kenzie light a rocket and launches him into the sky. The vengeful Daniela, who sees her plans jeopardized, tries to kill Alexis and Karla, but before she can do so, Maddie throws a shoe at her head, and the griffins and Daniela's monsters throw her into the serving cart and together with Darkwit and the traitor Jaydan (where he knock out by Kenzie) rolls out of the kingdom, winding up into the wilderness. In the end, the Darkness Kingdom have becoming Wonderful Kingdom, and the Cute and Fantasy live together again, as well as live in peace with the people of the kingdom, Alexis and Karla is then declared leader of the Cute and Fantasy, and Alexis and Karla start their relationship and both share a hug along with the yellow star. In the mid-credits scene, before the scrolling credits begin, Daniela, Darkwit and Jaydan's cart stops rolling. Daniela tried going to kill Jaydan for what he done. But, they but they soon find out they are on top of a giant fly-eating plant-like hill monster, who eat them both. Voice cast * Mary-Kate Olsen as Alexis, a young girl who is the later leader of the Cute village. * Ashley Olsen as Karla, a young mysterious girl who is the later master of the Fantasy village. * Beverley Mitchell as: ** Paulina, a girl who is Alexis's sidekick/best friend/assistant. ** Princess/Queen Maddie, the princess and now queen of the Darkness Kingdom. * Haley Joel Osment as Braden, a prom attire wearing boy who is Alexis's best friend/servant. * Jodi Benson as Belinda, a fashion-loving girl who is Alexis's best friend. * Jason Marsden as: ** Tempo, a disk jockey who is who is Alexis's best friend. ** Skyler, a boy who is Karla's friend. ** Lawson, a kind-hearted shadowy creature who works as a guard of the castle, as well as to Lady Daniela and has feelings for Maddie. ** Aaron Lohr provides Weston, Skyler and Lawson's singing voice. * Chris Rock as Zed, a lavender and black zebra who is Alexis's best friend. * James Hong as Phoenix, a green bird who given orders for Alexis. * Kate Higgins as Julissa, a girl who is Karla's friend/sidekick. * Queen Latifah as Kenzie, a shapeshifting creature who is helping Alexis and Karla to find their friends. * Catherine O'Hara as Lady Daniela, a mean-spirited mysterious overlord who want to revenge on cute and fantasy for banished her long time ago. * Gilbert Gottfried as Darkwit, Daniela's sardonic and intelligent scarlet macaw companion * Jeremy Irons as Evilbeak, a evil griffin who is leader of the griffins. * Diedrich Bader, Jack Black, and and Robbie Rist as Risky, Smirktail, and Nighttail, three griffins who works for Evilbeak. * Elijah Wood as Jaydan, a boy who is Alexis's best friend until he later revealed to be a coward, faker and double-crossing traitor willing to betray all the other cute and fantasy. * Samantha Mathis as Lauren, the leader of the Cute side and Alexis's mother. * Dennis Hopper as Kieran, the leader of the Fantasy side and Karla's father. * Tina Hopes as the Stars and Hearts. The voice actor is the director's daughter. * Frank Welker as Wade, Maddie's pet shadow dog. Additional voices * Jack Angel * Robert Bergen * Mary Kay Bergman * Rodger Bumpass * Corey Burton * Jim Cummings * Jennifer Darling * Debi Derryberry * Paul Eiding * Bill Farmer * Tianna Hopes * Kyler Fischer * Sherry Lynn * Danny Mann * Mickie McGowan * Phil Proctor Singers Coming soon! Production Development The idea of Lucky & Master was originally conceived by animators Thalia Ward and Tianna Hopes in the 1970s while working at Hanna-Barbera before their newly-formed animation studio Thalia Ward Productions was separated from Hanna-Barbera and renamed as ClearWorld Entertainment in 1985. Ward then came up with the story of the film, which was about a girl from happy place and a boy from fantasy place must stop an evil darkness and save their world from losing its happiness. After the success of ClearWorld's short film The Beauty Visitor in 1986, the studio was approached by Universal Studios to produce an animated feature film that would become Lucky & Master, an offer which the founders immediately accepted. The deal was settled in May 1986, Ward and Hopes, along with fellow ClearWorld animator Kyler Fischer, began working on the script of Lucky & Master. The original draft was completely different from the final version of the film. In the draft, Alexis was named Lucy while Karla was a male characters (known as Cullen). Lucy had found out that her world is coming apart by losing all the happiness that were stolen by wicked darkness so she must team up with Cullen to stop the darkness. After their victory of wiping out the monsters, Cullen then became the master of fantasy and married Lucy after she become the leader of happiness. Lucy is the only main character in the original draft who made it to the final version as Alexis, while Cullen become a female character as Karla. Some of the characters in the draft later become Alexis and Karla's family and friends in final film. ClearWorld approved of the film's script and pre-production for Lucky & Master started, set for a Thanksgiving 1988 release date. However, development for Lucky & Master was stalled in February 1987 when Universal and ClearWorld became concerned over the upcoming release of the 1988 animated films, Disney's Oliver & Company and Universal's another animated film The Land Before Time (which were both released on the same day). ClearWorld abandoned Lucky & Master in March 1988 after the studio had already designed six months worth pre-production and Universal had left the project. The studio then decided to start work on other projects, such as the short film One More Bite the television series Alaina Gleen to be aired on CBS in 1989. With the success of Alaina Gleen, ClearWorld began concerning their interest in restarting development on Lucky & Master in late 1995. ClearWorld chose to pitch the film to Warner Bros. though its feature animation department. They accepted this offer and revived the project the following year. The staff brought The Lion King writer Irene Mecchi and Kung Fu Panda writer Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger on to help rewrite their 1989 script with additional input from David Silverman. As Ward was busy on other projects at the time, writer Hopes and animator Fischer was selected to direct the film. Coming soon! Design Coming soon! Animation The animation was provided by Warner Bros. Feature Animation and ClearWorld Entertainment under the leadership of animation director Craig McCracken (while he still working on the 1998 Cartoon Network television show The Powerpuff Girls), Lauren Faust, Piet Kroon, as the film was animated in-house at the studio's main headquarters in Burbank, California and Glendale, California. Additional animation was done at JeremyWorks Studios and Valentina Animation in Burbank, as well as the animation done at overseas at Wang Film Productions/Cuckoo's Nest Studio in Taiwan, Yowza! Animation and Bardel Animation in Canada. Music : Main article: Lucky & Master/Soundtrack The film's original soundtrack was released by Warner Sunset Records on April 25, 2000. The songs for the film were composed by Hopes, Paul McCartney and Max Martin, while the score was composed by Patrick Doyle. Originally, Mark Mothersbaugh and Jon Powell was going to compose the score, but dropped out due to the former composing The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, while the latter was composing Chicken Run with Harry Gregson-Williams. The score for the film, composed by Doyle, was released through Atlantic Records on May 2, 2000. This is a list of musical numbers for the film: Release Lucky & Master was theatrically released by Warner Bros. Pictures on May 5, 2000 in the United States and Canada. The film's initial theatrical and video releases include The Beauty Visitor, ClearWorld's first short film released in 1986, starring Alaina Gleen and Karson from ClearWorld's animated series of the same name. Before The Beauty Visitor, a disclaimer appears reading: "In 1986, three years before Alaina Gleen, ClearWorld Entertainment produced their first film". After the success of the 3D re-release of Alternate Reality and The Wizard of Oz, Warner Bros. re-released Lucky & Master in 3D on the 15th anniversary of the film on March 6, 2015. Marketing The film was accompanied by a promotional campaign by Burger King. Trailers * The first teaser was released on May 14, 1999, and was shown before Arlene: The Story Begins, Tarzan, Objects Island, Muppets from Space, Inspector Gadget, and The Iron Giant. * The first official trailer was released on October 1, 1999, and was shown before The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland, Pokémon: The First Movie, Toy Story 2, Music Magic Legacy, Angel Quest, and Stuart Little. * The second official trailer was released on January 14, 2000, and was shown before My Dog Skip, Snow Day, The Tigger Movie, The Road to El Dorado, and The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas. Coming soon! Home media Lucky & Master was released on VHS and DVD on November 7, 2000. The DVD release included an audio commentary by Tianna Hopes, Kyler Fischer, and Thalia Ward, a 30-minute making-of documentary, a gallery of concept art, storyboards, test footage, deleted scenes, and DVD-ROM features. ClearWorld's 1986 short film, The Beauty Visitor, which was released theatrically with the feature film, was also included. The film was released for the first time on Blu-ray on May 25, 2010. It was later released on Blu-ray 3D on July 3, 2015. On January 7, 2020, a "20th Anniversary Edition" was released on DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, it featuring the same special features from the original 2000 DVD and 2010 Blu-ray as well as new ones including a sneak preview of a JeremyNow! original films, Lucky & Master 2. Cultural references Coming soon! Reception Critical response The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 95% approval rating with an average rating of 8/10 based on 167 reviews. The site's critical consensus states: "Lucky & Master's title promises wonderful family fun, enriched by a high-spirited voice ensemble, a visionary plot, and plenty of gags throughout." On Metacritic, the film holds a score of 98 out of 100 based on 37 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave the film five out of four stars and called it "an amazing animated cute-oriented and fantasy-oriented musical that highly lives up to the successful level as other Disney classics like Aladdin and The Lion King." Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film five-and-a-half stars out of four and describing it as "amazingly creative and outstanding with the heart and charm of other animated hits." Steven Rea of The Philadelphia Inquirer gave the film three out of four stars and said "Having the familiar standards and charm of Alaina Gleen and Quest of Camelot as well as the interesting concept, Lucky & Master is a new coming of age for ClearWorld Entertainment and Warner Bros. Feature Animation." USA Today's Susan Wloszczyna said that "Warner Bros. Pictures/ClearWorld Entertainment's Lucky & Master often entertains the family-friendly audience that keeps them joyful." However, some critics disliked the film's unexpected similarities with the animated films of the Disney Renaissance. Mark Caro of the Chicago Tribune gave the film two and a half stars out of four and compared the film to The Lion King, saying that "Lucky & Master feels like one of those shameless Disney rip-offs that have a story that sounds familiar to us." Andrew Sarris of The New York Observer criticized the film's characterization, and noted that the relationship between Lawson and Maddie was akin to "Aladdin and Jasmine all over again." On the more negative side, Christy Lemire of Associated Press called Lucky & Master poor man's Hercules. Box office The film was released on May 5, 2000, and grossed $58,876,054 on its opening weekend (Friday, May 5, 2000), opening at the top of box office. By the end of its theatrical run, it got to earn a worldwide gross of $543,184,659, becoming the highest-grossing non-Disney animated film of the year. Other media Video games Coming soon! Television series : Main article: Lucky & Master (TV series) ''and ''Lucky & Master: The Chronicles of Alexis and Karla Lucky & Master is a American animated television series created by ClearWorld Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation in 2000, based on Warner Bros. and ClearWorld's animated feature film of the same name. The series aired on the Kids' WB from August 11, 2001 and February 14, 2004. Coming soon! Sequel : Main article: Lucky & Master 2 Transcripts Main To see the main transcript of the film, click here. Trailers To see the transcript for the trailers of the film, click here. Category:Films